How I Got Into Hospice Music Therapy

This is a little follow up on my previous post, where I talked about how I got into music therapy. Today, I wanted to write about how I got involved in hospice. In case some people didn't know, music therapy can be used with a wide variety of populations, like hospice, hospitals, educational facilities, nursing facilities, rehabilitation, mental health centers, and even prisons. I think some people may have an idea of who they want to work with when they start studying music therapy. I, however, had absolutely no idea. If you recall, I barely even knew what music therapy was before I decided to major in it.

As my studies progressed, I decided, "Yes! I do want to this!" The next question, then, is "How and with whom do I want to do this?" You see, aside from the various populations to choose from, there are several different music therapy perspectives, methods, and approaches music therapy. How you believe music affects people can help you decide on a population to work with. Alternately, who you want to work with may affect your perspective on how music therapy works.

At first, I began thinking that I wanted to use music to help at-risk adolescents. I remember being a teenager and thinking that, some days, music was the only thing keeping me going. I expressed myself through music and thought that, if I could help teens express themselves positively, then I could help them make progress toward being successful in the world. I thought about this for several years in college, until one of my classes had a music therapist who worked in hospice come to speak. I immediately was drawn to it. I loved the idea of being able to bring some peace and quality of life to people who were dying. My only previous experience with music therapy and dying was during a practicum at the hospital in town. I had no idea what I was doing and I basically watched my supervisor take over and was pretty much in awe of the whole experience.

A few months later, it was time to start looking at internship sites and figuring out what I wanted the next step of my life to look like. I had decided that I would look into hospice settings, partly because I didn't have a hospice-specific practicum, and also because I thought I would really find the work rewarding. Long-story-short, I ended up getting accepted into the internship program at CarePartners Hospice in Asheville, NC and fell in love with the work. I loved working with the clients and their families. I enjoyed the challenge of learning all kinds of music. I especially loved the other people who worked in hospice. You need to be a special kind of person to deal with death on a daily basis and the people you can trust to do the job well are second-to-none the kind of people I want to be around.

Hopsice can be really challenging. An example of that is when a client died during my very first session this week. It can be emotionally exhausting and can leave you feeling almost numb sometimes. But a vast majority of the time, hospice workers are celebrating life, not worrying about death. Death will happen to all of us, so celebrate when you can.

How I Got Into Music Therapy

Through listening to a few great podcasts, like The Music Therapy with Janice Harris and Music Therapy Round Table, I have grown to realize that every music therapist came upon the profession a little differently. I guess I always knew this, but it has come to my attention a little more lately, so I thought I'd follow suit and give my little story.

I've been singing since before I can remember. My dad sang in a men's chorus and the church choir and, being a little boy, I wanted to be just like Dad. I remember singing the liturgy in church and I remember singing "Silent Night" by myself for church when I was about 5. It makes sense, then, that I focused much of my efforts in school on music. I always got good parts in little plays and musical productions, mostly because there were not a lot of other boys that wanted to do them. I don't think I ever made the conscious thought that "I want to make music for my life's work", but I think that, deep down, I always just wanted to make music as a career.

While I was developing as a musician, I also started finding that my friends would come to me when they needed to talk or needed support. I was good at keeping secrets and giving a different perspective on hard situations. People seemed to like that about me. Eventually, even people I didn't really hang out with would tell me their problems. This was around high school and it was about that time that I thought I could make a career helping people. I initially was thinking about counseling or psychology.

During my junior year, when all teachers start saying things like "When you get out of high school..." or "In a real job, you will have to/can't get away with..." and really started trying to get us to think about college or what jobs we wanted. I talked to my mom about wanting to do something with music but also liking the idea of helping people. She is a substitute teacher, so she took a prep hour and looked up various careers, printed out a list, and brought them home. She never said, "You should do this," which is good, because knowing myself at that point, I probably would have done the opposite. Music therapy was listed on the front page of the stack, though, and it immediately caught my attention. I spent some time on the American Music Therapy Association website and knew that's what I wanted to do.

I guess I got lucky, because I didn't really know anything about music therapy before going to school for it. I chose my college based on who had good programs in the Midwest. If music therapy hadn't worked out, my life would be a lot different that it is now. I can do my next post on how I chose which field of music therapy I wanted to work in, but I think this is enough for today.

Have a great weekend!